Quotes on Gratitude and Thanksgiving – 2014

Gratitude is always a “could” and never a “should.” The difference between you should practice gratitude and you could practice gratitude is comparable to the difference between you must eat ice cream and you may eat ice cream. If you somehow become obligated to eat large quantities of your favorite flavor of ice cream every day, you would soon detest it. Gratitude freely chosen is an experience, fundamentally different from gratitude simulated to satisfy someone else or to take care of your guilt. Timothy Miller in How to Want What You Have, p. 166

The giving of thanks is not just an activity to be taken up at certain times and set aside for others. It is a whole way of life. Fleming Rutledge in The Bible and the New York Times, p. 22

And yet, if we wait for every beggar to have his horse, we shall never be grateful for a ride. If we wait for every person to be fed, we shall never be grateful for our daily bread. If we wait for every peasant in the world to have a roof , we shall never be grateful for the roof that covers us while we sleep. If we wait until no one ever dies, we shall never feel grateful for life. Lewis Smedes in A Pretty Good Person, p. 21